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For decades, the H-1B visa program has been the centerpiece of America’s high-skilled immigration system.
To its defenders, it is a vital pipeline that brings talented workers from around the world to power the U.S. economy. But, to its critics, it is a system rife with abuse—one that can undermine American workers while also trapping foreign workers in exploitative arrangements.
A new book, Wild Wild East: Exiled Americans, Enslaved Indians and the Systemic Abuse of the H-1B Visa Programme, takes readers inside one especially shadowy corner of this world: the universe of so-called “desi consultancies.” These companies—also known as H-1B “body shops”— connect Indian tech workers to American employers through a maze of recruiters, subcontractors, universities, and corporate clients.
The book follows the lives of Indian H-1B seekers, displaced American tech workers, and the firms that profit from a deeply broken system. It is at a story about immigration, labor exploitation, globalization, and the darker side of the U.S.-India tech corridor.
To talk more about the book, Milan is joined on the show this week by its author, Tanul Thakur. Tanul is an award-winning journalist and film critic. In 2015, he won the National Film Award for Best Film Critic—the youngest critic to receive the honor. Wild Wild East is his first book.
Milan and Tanul discuss the latter’s firsthand experience with a “desi consultancy,” the exploitation many H-1B workers endure, and the role U.S. higher education plays in this ecosystem. Plus, the two discuss how Andhra Pradesh and Telangana became the epicenter of H-1B-related fraud and the ways in which the H-1B program can be reformed.
Episode notes:
1. Aditya Mani Jha, “The human cost of H1-B dream: Review of Tanul Thakur’s Wild Wild East,” Hindu, June 11, 2026.
2. Tanul Thakur, “‘Heads they won, tails he lost’: How ‘desi consultancies’ prey on Indian grads in America,” NewsLaundry, May 24, 2026.
3. Anant Gupta, “Indians slam MAGA ‘war’ over H-1B skilled-worker visas as ‘racist,’” Washington Post, January 7, 2025.
The audio of this podcast was optimized using Adobe Podcast Enhancer AI. No alterations were made to the substance of the conversation.
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In democracies, we typically assume that public opinion on issues like jobs, the economy, and inflation matter for shaping policy and politics. But opinions on foreign policy are often treated as the preserve of elites, especially in a country like India.
Yet, it turns out that we know surprisingly little about what ordinary Indians think about foreign policy, how stable those views are, and whether they influence the choices that governments make.
A new short book, Indian Public Opinion toward the Major Powers, tackles these questions by examining more than six decades of Indian attitudes toward the United States, China, and Russia. The book draws on a wide range of survey data to ask how Indians view the major powers, how those views have shifted over time, and what they reveal about democracy, accountability, and foreign policy in India.
To discuss the book, co-authors Aidan Milliff and Paul Staniland join Milan on the podcast this week. Aidan is an assistant professor of political science at Florida State University. Many moons ago, he was a James C. Gaither Junior Fellow with the Carnegie South Asia Program. Paul is professor of political science at the University of Chicago and a non-resident scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
The trio discuss the treasure trove of data on Indian public opinion the authors stumbled upon, the characteristics of India’s “foreign policy public,” and the variation in Indian attitudes toward the United States, China, and Russia/the Soviet Union. Plus, the discuss why a respondent’s region emerges as a strong predictor of one’s foreign policy views.
Episode notes:
Aidan Milliff and Paul Staniland, “Replication Archive: India Public Opinion Toward the Major Powers,” May 2026. Paul Staniland, “The Indian ‘foreign policy public,’” paulstaniland.com (Blog), May 6, 2026. Christine Huang, “Americans see India in positive light, but few have confidence in Modi,” Pew Research Center, June 21, 2023. Paul Staniland and Vipin Narang, “Democratic Accountability and Foreign Security Policy: Theory and Evidence from India,” Security Studies 27, no. 3 (2018): 410-447. Aidan Milliff and Paul Staniland, "Indian Public Opinion toward the Major Powers," in Elements in Indo-Pacific Security, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2026). (The piece is publicly available until June 15, 2026) -
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India’s relations with Europe are often viewed through the lens of Brussels, Paris, Berlin, or London. But in recent years, India has also been deepening its ties with another important set of partners: the Nordic countries.
Recently, Prime Minister Narendra Modi traveled to Oslo for the third India-Nordic Summit, bringing together India and the five Nordic countries—Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland, and Denmark.
The agenda for the six countries was wide-ranging, covering trade, investment, green technology, maritime cooperation, the Arctic, and the Indo-Pacific.
The visit also marked the first official trip by an Indian prime minister to Norway in more than four decades. As a result of the summit, Norway and India have elevated their bilateral relationship with new agreements on climate, technology, science, and the blue economy.
To discuss what all of this means for India, Norway, and the changing global order, Milan is joined this week by May-Elin Stener, who serves as Ambassador of Norway to India, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and the Maldives.
Prior to taking up this position, Ambassador Stener was the Deputy Director General of the Regional department in the foreign ministry. She has served as Norway’s Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York as well as Deputy Head of the Norwegian Embassy in Pretoria, South Africa. She has been a member of the Norwegian Foreign Service since 1995.
Milan and Ambassador Stener discuss the outcomes of the India-Nordic summit, the Trade and Economic Partnership Agreement (TEPA), and the green technology partnership Norway envisions with India. Plus, the two discussed linkages between the Arctic and the Indo-Pacific and the controversy over a Norwegian journalist’s questioning of Indian officials in Oslo.
Episode notes:
Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, “India-Norway Joint Statement,” May 18, 2026. Government of Sweden, “Joint Statement: 3rd India-Nordic Summit, Oslo, 19 May 2026,” May 19, 2026. Priyanka Shankar, “India-Nordic summit: Why is Modi wooing Northern Europe?” Al Jazeera, May 19, 2026. “The India-Nordic Summit: What It Is and What Has Now Been Set in Motion,” India’s World, May 20, 2026. Suhasini Haidar, “Commitment to democracy makes India, Nordic nations natural partners: Modi,” Hindu, May 20, 2026. -
After the latest round of state elections, India’s political landscape looks more lopsided than at any time in the post-2014 era. The BJP claimed big wins in West Bengal and Assam—continuing its march across eastern India and solidifying its status as a hegemonic party.
But politics at home is only part of the story.
Overseas, India is facing a turbulent moment—from the Iran war and Pakistan’s diplomatic resurgence to Trump 2.0’s approach to China and the uncertain future of the Quad.
To talk about the BJP’s dominance, the opposition’s crisis, and India’s positioning in a rapidly shifting world, Milan is joined this week by Grand Tamasha regulars, Sadanand Dhume and Tanvi Madan.
Sadanand is a senior fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is also a regular columnist for the Wall Street Journal.
Tanvi Madan is a senior fellow in the Center for Asia Policy Studies in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution.
The trio discuss whether India is becoming a “one-party state,” the current state of the opposition, and the headwinds facing the Indian economy. Plus, the three discuss Pakistan’s diplomatic moment, Trump’s recent China trip, and Marco Rubio’s visit to India.
Episode notes:
Sadanand Dhume, “Why Would Anyone Trust Pakistan to Mediate With Iran?” Wall Street Journal, May 20, 2026. Sadanand Dhume, “India’s Ruling Party Beats the Odds,” Wall Street Journal, May 6, 2026. Sadanand Dhume, “Pakistan Has Put Itself Back on the Diplomatic Map,” Wall Street Journal, April 8, 2026. [Audio] “Flash Episode: India's 2026 Elections Explained (with Yamini Aiyar and Neelanjan Sircar),” Grand Tamasha, May 8, 2026. Tanvi Madan, “India’s China Strategy in an Uncertain Strategic Environment,” in Milan Vaishnav, ed., India and a Changing Global Order: Foreign Policy in the Trump 2.0 Era (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2026) [Video] “Udit Misra Explains | Forex Fears? What PM Modi’s Big Appeal Actually Says About India’s Economy,” Indian Express, May 12, 2026. “From UP to Karnataka: Six Routes Around the 1991 Places of Worship Act,” The Wire, May 17, 2026. -
India’s growth numbers shape how we understand everything from jobs to investment to global standing. But what if those numbers don’t tell the full story?
New research suggests India may have both underestimated and overestimated growth at different moments over the past two decades. That insight opens the door to a broader conversation about India’s macroeconomic choices, from exchange rate policy to electricity pricing to the quiet persistence of trade barriers.
To discuss these issues and many more, Abhishek Anand joins Milan on the podcast this week. Abhishek is the Founder and Managing Director of Insignia Policy Research and a Visiting Fellow at the Madras Institute of Development Studies. He’s previously worked as an Economist at the World Bank and was a member of the Indian Economic Service, working in key positions throughout the Indian Ministry of Finance.
Together, with Arvind Subramanian and Josh Felman, Abhishek is the author of a new working paper published by the Peterson Institute for International Economics titled “India's 20 Years of GDP Misestimation: New Evidence.”
Abhishek and Milan discuss the controversy over India’s GDP estimates, important reforms within India’s statistics ministry, and the debate over the Reserve Bank of India’s policies to defend the rupee. Plus, the two discuss Abhishek’s work on power sector reform and the embrace of non-tariff barriers that stymie the spirit of India’s new bilateral trade agreements.
Episode notes:
Abhishek Anand, Josh Felman, and Arvind Subramanian, “India's 20 years of GDP misestimation: New evidence,” Peterson Institute of International Economics Working Paper 26-3, March 2026. Abhishek Anand, Arvind Subramanian, and Josh Felman, “How GDP data misread the economy, complicated policy,” Indian Express, March 14, 2026. Abhishek Anand and Naveen Thomas, “Free Trade on Paper, Protection in Practice: How India’s Policy Interventions Hollow Out Trade Liberalisation,” O.P. Jindal Global University, January 2026. Abhishek Anand, Arvind Subramanian, and Josh Felman, “Going forward, RBI’s rupee policy must not repeat errors of recent history,” Indian Express, December 29, 2025. Abhishek Anand, Praveen Ravi, Navneeraj Sharma, and Arvind Subramanian, “To help India’s economy, unleash the power sector,” Indian Express, August 27, 2025. -
For more than a decade, India has steadily deepened its ties with the Gulf while trying to balance competing interests across the region. But today, that strategy is under strain—thanks to the Iran conflict, shifting regional alignments, a reemerging Pakistan.
How is India being impacted by the Iran crisis? And what do these geopolitical shifts mean for India’s West Asia policy?
To discuss these and other questions, Milan is joined on the show this week by Kabir Taneja. Kabir is the Executive Director of the Observer Research Foundation’s Middle East office. He has worked extensively on India’s relations with the Middle East, examining domestic political dynamics, terrorism, non-state militant actors, and the region’s evolving security architecture. He is also the author of The ISIS Peril: The World’s Most Feared Terror Group and Its Shadow on South Asia.
Milan and Kabir discuss India’s emerging political and strategic relationships in the Gulf, the risks the country faces from the Iran conflict, and the potential for India to play a larger regional security role in the Middle East. Plus, the two discuss Pakistan’s frenetic diplomatic maneuvering and the state of Afghanistan-India ties.
Episode notes:
Kabir Taneja, “Pak Is Finally Back In Middle East's 'Good Books'. But Can It Stay There?” NDTV, April 30, 2026. Kabir Taneja, “How Air Power will Reshape Geopolitics in the Gulf,” ORF Middle East, April 17, 2026. Kabir Taneja, “A West Asia security rethink amid America’s role,” Hindu, April 2, 2026. Kabir Taneja, “Reading the tea leaves in the conflict in West Asia,” Hindustan Times, March 10, 2026. Kabir Taneja, “Navigating Strategic Autonomy: India and the Middle East in a Multipolar World,” February 9, 2026. Nicolas Blarel, “India Navigates a Divided Middle East,” in Milan Vaishnav, ed. India and a Changing Global Order: Foreign Policy in the Trump 2.0 Era (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2026). Kabir Taneja, “Between New Delhi & Kabul, a fine balance,” Hindustan Times, October 13, 2025. -
** NOTE TO LISTENERS: This week, we are releasing a special “flash episode” of Grand Tamasha to recap India’s recently concluded 2026 state assembly elections. As usual, we will still be publishing a new Grand Tamasha episode next Tuesday, May 12 at 9 pm ET, Wednesday 6:30 am IST.
It’s safe to say that India’s 2026 state assembly elections have scrambled many of the assumptions that have long shaped our understanding of Indian politics.
The BJP has finally captured West Bengal after decades of trying, secured a third consecutive victory in Assam, and made modest, but important gains in Kerala. With its allies, it also retained the union territory of Puducherry. In Tamil Nadu, meanwhile, the upstart TVK—led by the enigmatic actor Vijay—has disrupted a political duopoly that has defined the state for decades.
At a deeper level, across these elections, familiar assumptions about welfare, identity, institutions, and opposition politics have suddenly been called into question.
To make sense of these results—and what they might tell us about the road to 2029—Milan is joined today by two of the sharpest observers of Indian politics and political economy.
Neelanjan Sircar is an associate professor at Ahmedabad University and one of the country’s leading scholars of Indian politics. He has spent years studying party organizations, welfare politics, and electoral change across states—including West Bengal and Assam.
Yamini Aiyar is a Senior Visiting Fellow at the Saxena Center for Contemporary South Asia and the Watson Institute at Brown University. She was previously president and CEO of the Centre for Policy Research, and is a leading expert on the Indian state, welfare delivery, and democratic accountability.
Milan, Yamini, and Neelanjan discuss the BJP’s historic win in West Bengal, the demise of the Trinamool Congress of Mamata Banerjee, and the Election Commission of India’s controversial revision of the electoral rolls. Plus, the trio discuss the rupture in Tamil politics, the Congress’ lone victory in Kerala, and the BJP’s strategy for 2029.
Episode notes:
Samanth Subramanian, “From Sea to Saffron Sea: Neelanjan Sircar,” Equator, May 6, 2026. Roshan Kishore, “Terms of Trade: And then there were none,” Hindustan Times, May 4, 2026. Neelanjan Sircar and Bhanu Joshi, “Party has left the building: The rise of parallel politics in Bengal,” Hindustan Times, May 4, 2026. Neelanjan Sircar, “Verdict Bengal: Decisive win in a divided state,” Hindustan Times, May 4, 2026. Bhanu Joshi, “DMK’s defeat proves it: Welfare is the floor, elections have moved to the ceiling,” Indian Express, May 4, 2026. Neelanjan Sircar and Bhanu Joshi, “Beyond numbers, how West Bengal's voter roll revision is redrawing citizenship lines,” Hindustan Times, April 29, 2026. Bhanu Joshi and Neelanjan Sircar, “In Bengal hinterland, poll victory might hinge on ground visibility,” Hindustan Times, April 23, 2026. -
India hasn’t updated how political power is distributed across its states in five decades—and the consequences are mounting. At the heart of delimitation lies a fundamental tension: should representation follow population, or preserve a delicate federal balance? Successive governments chose to defer the question, freezing India’s electoral map even as demographic divides deepened. The Modi government’s recent push to overhaul the system brought these tensions into the open but ultimately failed to resolve them.
Recently, Milan sat down with Shruti Rajagopalan of the Mercatus Center at George Mason University for a wide-ranging webinar on delimitation, representation, and the reshaping of Indian democracy. The two discussed how India reached the present impasse—and what happens next. Milan and Shruti unpack the constitutional rules governing delimitation, the scale of malapportionment in the Lok Sabha, and the politics behind the Modi government’s failed 2026 push to overhaul the system. Plus, they discuss scenarios for the future.
On this week’s show, we present the audio and video from this recent conversation as a joint collaboration between Grand Tamasha and Shruti’s Ideas of India podcast.
Episode notes:
Shruti Rajagopalan, “India’s delimitation battles are costing its poorest voters,” Times of India, April 25, 2026. Shruti Rajagopalan, “Delimitation: At heart of row, value of a vote, fiscal imbalance,” Indian Express, April 23, 2026. M.R. Madhavan, “Implications of increasing the size of the Lok Sabha,” Hindu, April 16, 2024. Shruti Rajagopalan, “Demography, Delimitation, and Democracy,” Get Down and Shruti (Substack), July 3, 2023. Pranay Kotasthane, “India Policy Watch: Delimitation as an Opportunity for a Grand Bargain,” Anticipating the Unintended (Substack), June 18, 2023. Milan Vaishnav and Jamie Hintson, “India’s Emerging Crisis of Representation,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, March 14, 2019. -
For more than three decades, India’s growth story has rested on the promise of a large and youthful workforce—but whether that promise is being realized remains an open question.
A new report published by the Centre for Sustainable Employment at Azim Premji University—State of Working India 2026—takes a comprehensive look at how young Indians move from education into the labor market—and asks whether India is successfully converting its demographic dividend into an economic one.
The report documents a striking paradox: even as educational attainment has expanded dramatically, the transition to stable, gainful employment remains uncertain—with high graduate unemployment, limited job creation outside agriculture, and persistent gaps between aspirations and opportunities.
To discuss the report, this week on the show Milan speaks with the report’s lead author Rosa Abraham, who heads theCentre for Sustainable Employment at Azim Premji University. Her research focuses on informal work and women’s employment, with a particular interest in issues at the intersection of labor statistics and women’s work. Prior to joining the university, she worked as a researcher at the Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and Environment and as a lecturer at the Madras School of Economics.
Milan and Rosa discuss the state of India’s mythical “demographic dividend,” the quality and quantity of higher education, and India’s stalled structural transformation. Plus, the two discuss the high unemployment rate for college graduates, trends in internal migration, and the loosening of caste-based occupational segregation.
Episode notes:
“India’s Middle Class Hits a Breaking Point (with Saurabh Mukherjea and Nandita Rajhansa),” Grand Tamasha, April 15, 2026. Rishita Khanna, “‘We are not overproducing graduates, we are underproducing good jobs,’” Hindu, March 25, 2026. Soutik Biswas, “India's young are more educated than ever. So why are so many jobless?” BBC, March 19, 2026. Karthik Madhavapeddi, “‘For 1st Time In 4 Decades, Young Men Are Withdrawing From Education,’” IndiaSpend, March 27, 2026. -
Over the past several decades, the story of Silicon Valley has been deeply intertwined with the story of Indian immigrants—engineers, entrepreneurs, and investors who helped shape the technology revolution while building new bridges between the United States and India.
Few individuals embody that journey as vividly Kanwal Rekhi. Rekhi was the first Indian-American founder & CEO to take a venture-backed company public on the NASDAQ. He also co-founded and built The Indus Entrepreneurs—or TiE—into the largest global network of Indian entrepreneurs, and cofounded Inventus—where he is building the venture franchise into a catalyst for India’s tech revolution.
He writes about his life in his new memoir, The Groundbreaker: Entrepreneurship, the American Dream, and the Rise of Modern India, which traces his remarkable journey from a modest upbringing in India to becoming one of the most influential figures in the Indian diaspora in the United States.
To talk more about his book, Kanwal joins Milan on the podcast this week. They discuss his lifelong passion for entrepreneurship, his modest upbringing and challenging early family life, and his role in building the modern Internet. Plus, the two discuss Kanwal’s role in India’s landmark telecommunications reforms and his recent efforts to boost entrepreneurs in India.
Episode notes:
“The Secret to Indian Americans' Success (with Meenakshi Ahamed),” Grand Tamasha, June 4, 2025. Meenakshi Ahamed, Indian Genius: The Meteoric Rise of Indians in America (New Delhi: HarperCollins India, 2025). Kanwal Rekhi, “I’m a tech founder from India. Here’s why I’m worried about the future of America,” San Francisco Chronicle, February 3, 2026. Zofeen Maqsood, “Kanwal Rekhi’s next mission: 10 million entrepreneurs by India at 100,” American Bazaar, March 3, 2026. -
For decades, India’s growth story has rested on the spectacular rise of its middle class. But a new book argues that this very group—roughly 40 million income-tax–paying households—is now under acute strain.
Facing a convergence of job disruption, wage stagnation, and rising debt, the middle class may no longer be the engine of growth it once was. This is the argument made in a new book titled, Breakpoint: The Crisis of the Middle Class and the Future of Work. It is authored by Saurabh Mukherjea, along with Nandita Rajhansa and Sapana Bhavsar
Saurabh is the founder of Marcellus Investment Managers and the author of six previous books. Prior to setting up Marcellus, Saurabh was the CEO of Ambit Capital. He is also a Founding Director of the Association of Portfolio Managers in India
Nandita is an economist and a small and midcap analyst at Marcellus. She’s the co-author of a national bestseller, Behold the Leviathan: The Unusual Rise of Modern India, which was published in 2024.
Milan speaks with Saurabh and Nandita about the Indian middle class’s most vulnerable moment since 1991, the hollowing out of middle-skill jobs, the structural challenges with India’s education system, the worrying trend in declining placement rates and salaries, and the explosion in household debt. Plus, the trio discuss how AI and automation are remaking the Indian economy—both for good and for ill.
Episode notes:
Saurabh Mukherjea and Nandita Rajhansa, “Educated and employed but still struggling: India's middle class under strain,” BBC, March 30, 2026. “A Sixth of Humanity and the Dreams of a Nation (with Devesh Kapur and Arvind Subramanian),” Grand Tamasha, October 22, 2025. Saurabh Mukherjea, Nandita Rajhansa and Sapana Bhavsar, “Graduate and unemployed: India’s middle-class rulebook for career & success no longer works,” ThePrint, March 23, 2026. -
On this week’s show, Milan sits down with the novelist Karan Mahajan, author of a much-anticipated new novel, The Complex. Karan and Milan discussed the book at our first ever live Grand Tamasha event at Carnegie headquarters in Washington, DC on March 16. Karan is an associate professor in Literary Arts at Brown University and the author of the books Family Planning and The Association of Small Bombs.
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Donald Trump’s return to the White House has once again altered the contours of international politics. For India, this evolving context raises several important questions about the viability of its foreign policy approach. This week on the podcast, Milan sits down with three of the contributors to a new compilation published by the Carnegie Endowment—Shoumitro Chatterjee, Sameer Lalwani, and Tanvi Madan—to discuss the uncertain trajectory of Indian foreign policy.
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Over the past two decades, Washington and New Delhi have drawn steadily closer—driven by shared concerns about China, expanding economic ties, and a growing Indian diaspora in the United States. To help us unpack all of this, this week Milan spoke with Congressman Ami Bera in his office on Capitol Hill.
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For decades, Bangladesh has long oscillated between competitive democracy and dominant-party rule. In 2024, mass protests brought an abrupt end to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s long tenure in power, opening the door to Bangladesh’s most consequential election in more than a decade—one that returned the Bangladesh Nationalist Party to power and reshaped the country’s political landscape.
With Hasina’s fall and a new government in office, the country once again stands at a crossroads—testing whether institutional reform and electoral competition can deliver lasting democratic stability.
To talk about the new political era in Bangladesh, Milan is joined on the show this week by Naomi Hossain. Naomi is Global Research Professor with the Department of Development Studies at SOAS University of London. She has researched extensively across Bangladesh and has managed large international studies spanning 20 countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Europe. Naomi is the author of the acclaimed 2017 book, The Aid Lab: Understanding Bangladesh's Unexpected Success.
Naomi and Milan discuss the abrupt end to Hasina’s fifteen-year rule, the performance of the interim government under Muhammad Yunus, and the prospects for new prime minister Tarique Rahman. Plus, the two discuss the country’s immense economic challenges and the role of the military.
Episode notes:
Naomi Hossain, “Ali Riaz's Big Bet,” Counterpoint, January 19, 2026. Naomi Hossain, “Dhaka pre-election diary (pt 1, possibly, of 2),” Substack, January 6-19, 2026. “How India Lost the Neighborhood (with Muhib Rahman),” Grand Tamasha, February 11, 2026. “Sri Lanka's Peaceful Revolution (with Neil DeVotta),” Grand Tamasha, January 25, 2025. -
Just weeks ago, India hosted the 2026 AI Impact Summit, the latest chapter in a global process that began in 2023 in the UK. For India, the stakes could not be higher: it’s a country with immense technical talent and a data-rich digital ecosystem, but also a services-led growth model that AI could either boost or seriously disrupt.
For the Modi government, the summit was part diplomatic showcase, part investment pitch, and part declaration of ambition. To talk more about the summit and its key takeaways, Milan is joined on the show this week by Anirudh Suri.
Anirudh is a nonresident scholar with Carnegie India. His interests lie at the intersection of technology and geopolitics, climate, and strategic affairs. He is also a managing partner at India Internet Fund, a technology-focused venture capital fund based in India and the United States. He’s the author of The Great Tech Game: Shaping Geopolitics and the Destinies of Nations, published in 2022. And he’s also the host of a podcast by the same name, “The Great Tech Game,” which focuses on technology, business and geopolitics.
Milan and Anirudh discuss the evolution of global AI summitry, the debate over India’s elusive “DeepSeek moment,” and the country’s indigenous large language models (LLMs). Plus, the two discuss the effects of AI on India’s services industry and India’s quest to marshal its domestic scientific talent.
Episode notes:
1. Anirudh Suri, “Learning from DeepSeek, honing India’s AI strategy,” Hindustan Times, March 2, 2025.
2. Anirudh Suri, “The Missing Pieces in India’s AI Puzzle: Talent, Data, and R&D,” Carnegie India, February 24, 2025.
3. Anirudh Suri, “Winning the AI race with research talent,” Hindustan Times, November 3, 2024.
4. “Governing India's Digital Revolution (with Rahul Matthan),” Grand Tamasha, January 23, 2024.
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We tend to think of populist leaders around the world as disruptive—skeptical of international institutions, impatient for change, and prone to upending foreign policy norms.
But a new book by scholars Sandra Destradi and Johannes Plagemann argues that—while populists can have dramatic impacts on foreign policy—the extent of change depends on two key factors: the personalization of foreign policy and leaders’ ability to use foreign policy as a tool of domestic political mobilization.
The book is called Populism and Foreign Policy, and it looks at transitions from non-populist to populist governments in Bolivia, the Philippines, Turkey, and India.
To talk more about the book’s findings—especially as they relate to Indian foreign policy—Sandra Destradi joins Milan on the show this week. Sandra holds the Chair of International Relations at the University of Freiburg, Germany, and she is currently serving as a DAAD long- term Guest Professor at Reichman University in Herzliya, Israel. She is the author of several articles and books on India, including the 2012 book, Indian Foreign and Security Policy in South Asia: Regional Power Strategies.
Milan and Sandra discuss the definitional debates around populism, the conditional effects of populism on foreign policy, and the reasons for the Modi government’s differential approach to Pakistan and China. Plus, the two discuss why populists might express an enhanced willingness to contribute to global public goods, the limited opportunities for mobilization against multilateral institutions, and the differences between populists in the Global North versus the Global South.
Episode notes:
1. “Populism, South Asian Style (with Adnan Naseemullah and Pradeep Chhibber),” Grand Tamasha, December 18, 2024.
2. Johannes Plagemann and Sandra Destradi, “Populism and Foreign Policy: The Case of India,” Foreign Policy Analysis 15, no. 2 (April 2019): 283–301.
3. Sandra Destradi, “Domestic Politics and Regional Hegemony: India’s Approach to Sri Lanka,” E-International Relations, January 14, 2014.
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Over the past year, Europe–India relations have entered a markedly upbeat phase. What was once a diffuse partnership—long on rhetoric, short on strategy—now looks far more purposeful.
From the announcement on a long-delayed EU-India Free Trade Agreement to expanding cooperation on security, technology, and migration, Europe and India appear to be—finally—converging around a shared strategic logic.
To unpack what’s driving this convergence—and where its limits lie—Milan is joined on the show this week by Garima Mohan. Garima is a senior fellow in the Indo-Pacific program at the German Marshall Fund based in Brussels. In this capacity, she leads GMF’s work on India and serves as convenor of the India Trilateral Forum.
Her research focuses on Europe-India ties, EU foreign policy in Asia, and security in the Indo-Pacific. She’s also the author of a new GMF report titled, “A Long Time Coming: Europe and India have discovered a strategic partnership,” published in January 2026.
Milan and Garima discuss the geopolitical drivers that are bringing the EU and India closer together, Europe’s views on the limits to India’s potential, and the key takeaways from the EU-India FTA. Plus, the two discuss how Russia might derail Indo-European security cooperation and the urgent need for Europe to invest in India expertise.
Episode notes:
1. “Europe’s long-awaited free-trade deal with India,” The Economist, January 25, 2026.
2. Garima Mohan, “As Trump takes Office, Planets Align for the EU and India,” India’s World, March 6, 2025.
3. “Can Europe be India's Plan B? (with James Crabtree),” Grand Tamasha, September 17, 2025.
4. “India and the Reordering of Transatlantic Relations (with Tara Varma),” Grand Tamasha, March 11, 2025.
5. “Mr. Modi Goes to Europe (with Garima Mohan),” Grand Tamasha, May 11, 2022.
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After years of trade skepticism, India appears to be back in the deal-making business—signing new agreements, reviving stalled talks, and announcing ambitious frameworks with key bilateral partners.
A few weeks ago, the European Union and India announced a mega-trade deal that was more than two decades in the works. And just days after this news broke, the White House announced that the United States had also reached an understanding with India on trade, an issue which had sapped relations between the two erstwhile partners over the past year.
To help make sense of what’s changed—and what hasn’t—Milan is joined on this show this week by Mark Linscott. Mark is a nonresident senior fellow on India at the Atlantic Council and a Senior Advisor with The Asia Group. He previously served as the assistant US trade representative for South and Central Asian Affairs from 2016 to 2018.
He has more than 30 years of experience working on trade and economic issues at the Commerce Department and USTR. It is my pleasure to welcome him to the show for the very first time.
Milan and Mark discuss India’s new external trade posture, the geopolitics and economics of the EU-India FTA, and the timing and substance of India’s trade deal with the United States. Plus, the two discuss India’s relative positioning vis-à-vis other Asian competitors and the possible roadblocks in the way of a larger U.S.-India accord.
Episode notes:
Ravi Dutta Mishra, “How India’s US deal tariff advantage over Bangladesh vanished overnight,” Indian Express, February 10, 2026.Arvind Subramanian, “India may be about to become one of the world’s most open economies,” The Economist, February 5, 2026.Michael Kugelman and Mark Linscott, “What to know about the US-India trade deal,” Atlantic Council “Dispatches” blog, February 2, 2026. “Can the U.S. Salvage Its Relationship with India? (with Lisa Curtis),” Grand Tamasha, February 4, 2026.Michael Kugelman and Mark Linscott, “The India–EU trade deal is worth watching, but not overhyping,” Atlantic Council “Dispatches” blog, January 27, 2026. -
Over the past few years, South Asia has witnessed a striking wave of mass protests toppling governments and upending long-standing political arrangements in countries ranging from Bangladesh to Nepal and Sri Lanka. These upheavals are often explained in terms of domestic factors—such as corruption, economic mismanagement, and democratic backsliding.
But in a recent Foreign Affairs essay titled “The Folly of India’s Illiberal Hegemony,” the scholar Muhib Rahman argues that there is a larger regional story at play—one that implicates not just local leaders, but also India and the United States. The essay challenges the assumption that India’s regional leadership has been a stabilizing force and asks whether New Delhi’s choices have instead helped create openings for China across South Asia.
To talk more about the essay, Muhib joins Milan on the show this week. Muhib is a Perry World House Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania. His research sits at the intersection of international security, emerging technologies, and the politics of the Global South. He has served as a Postdoctoral Associate at Cornell University and holds a Ph.D. in Government from the University of Texas-Austin.
Muhib and Milan discuss India’s illiberal hegemony in its neighborhood, the downturn in Bangladesh-India ties, and the enabling role of the United States. Plus, the two discuss the drivers of the “India Out” phenomenon in countries ranging from Nepal to the Maldives and how China is positioning itself to take advantage.
Episode notes:
1. Muhib Rahman, “Bangladesh’s Quiet Pivot to China,” The National Interest, October 27, 2025.
2. Muhib Rahman, “Explaining Trump’s Surprising Turn to Pakistan,” War on the Rocks, October 1, 2025.
3. “Why Washington Is Wooing Pakistan (with Uzair Younus),” Grand Tamasha, October 1, 2025.
4. “Sri Lanka's Peaceful Revolution (with Neil DeVotta),” Grand Tamasha, January 29, 2025. - Visa fler
